Too Long
by Yero my hero
Summary: This is an alternate ending to Wicked, because, well, I like happy endings. Oneshot.


I was in a "what-if" mood. So, this is my What if. What if Fiyero had been the Scarecrow after all? This is a **Bookverse** one-shot, but could one day evolve into being the prequel to a story. Maybe. But, not soon.

**Important:** This starts in the tower room whenever Dorothy and Co. are at the bottom of the hill. The Witch has just sent her bees after the troupe, and Liir, Nanny, and Elphaba are watching the devastation through an eyeglass that Elphaba made.

Disclaimer: It should also be recognized that quite a few lines of this, mostly at the very beginning, are taken directly from Gregory Maguire's own Wicked to more seamlessly integrate into the story. Wicked does not belong to me. But, if it did, maybe I would have ended it more like this. :D

* * *

"Liir, take that from her and tell me what happens." 

Liir gave a blow-by-blow recounting. "They're swooping down, they look like a genie or something, all flying in a big clump with a straggly tail. The travelers see them coming. Yes! Yes! The Scarecrow is taking straw out of his chest and leggings, and covering the Lion and Dorothy, and there's a little dog, too. So the bees can't get through the straw, but—wait, there's a man--"

"Liir, give that to me," she shouted. Her heart roared like a wind.

It was true. There were ankles and wrists visible where straw had once been, clothes hanging limply from a form devoid of its packing.

The Witch drew her breath in sharply—so sharply, she feared she would faint. Everything slowed, the dark whirlwind of bees reducing to a mere hum as they floated down the cliff. "No!" she shouted, her voice an anguished cry ripping through the frozen moment, shattering it.

The bees flung themselves against the Tin Woodman, dropping in black heaps on the ground like charred shadows, their stingers blunted at the fenders.

She let the telescope fall with a crash, but was unaware of the glass shattering at her feet. Teetering precariously at the edge of the window, she clutched the windowsill tightly, anchoring herself to her last desperate shred of reason, to stop her from flinging herself out the window to the figures far below.

"You've got the give our guests some credit for ingenuity," said Liir, breaking the trance that had fallen upon the room. Nanny began to blither on about cheese and crackers.

"Will you two please have mercy on me!" the Witch cried vehemently. Nanny hobbled out the door as fast as her old limbs would carry her. "Chistery, let her go. I need you here."

She explained to Chistery what she wanted. "Go and fetch the Scarecrow and bring him to me. Let Dorothy and the others be. Can you do this?"

He flew off out the window and Liir seemed to realize the Witch was in no state to be interrogated, hurrying from the room and leaving her to collapse in a heap upon the floor.

"Fiyero…" she spoke the name aloud. It couldn't possibly be so simple. After all, there are no Happily-Ever-After's in the life of a witch.

Despite herself, she stumbled out of the tower and down to the courtyard below, waiting in the shadows gathering beneath the parapet and wringing her hands.

She heard Chistery land with a soft _whump _outside the door, and flew to answer it, but pulled back quickly when it flung open and banged harshly against the rough stone wall.

Through the doorway strode a figure clad in disheveled clothes, accompanying the weak light now shining meekly through the door.

Anxiously, fearfully, she allowed her eyes to adjust to the damnable light, hoping and wishing past practicality. Fiyero spotted her and dropped the gloves and mask to the floor, moving uncertainly as if to wrap her in his arms.

Upon reaching the place where the hazy beams of sunlight met the impenetrable darkness of the castle, he paused, stretching out his hands as if reaching for her through some invisible barrier that he could not pass. Uncertainly, she raised trembling hands and placed her fingertips to his own, overwhelmed with disbelief and desire at the touch that she had longed for for… too long.

Breaking the barrier, the impassible invisible wall, he stilled her hands and linked his fingers with hers, whispering words that she did not hear.

The years of solitude and resentment and pain and longing rushed over her, pressing on her from all sides, so strongly representing her broken spirit and broken mind that she feared her body too was broken, that she would splinter and fall to the floor.

She swooned and collapsed into his arms. Desperately, she pressed herself into him, forcing him against the door and into the receding light.

Anything to fill her emptiness.


End file.
